The Iowa Review Volume 11 Issue 2 Spring-Summer 1980

America's "Hurrah Game": Baseball and Walt Whitman Lowell Edwin Folsom

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Article 7

America's

Whitman

"Hurrah

Game":

Baseball

and Walt

Lowell Edwin Folsom to

Passage

Thou

India!

. . .

rondure of the world ?Walt

Whitman,

at last accomplish'd. "Passage

to

India"

1 8 8 8 - 8 9, American IN THE OF WINTER baseball set out on its own passage to India. Albert G. to become the later Spalding, sporting goods effort" to the magnate, decided it was time to make a "Base Ball missionary was his for baseball enthusiasm his unbounded: world; (like alliteration) I claim the fact

that Base Ball owes its prestige as our National Game that as no other form of sport it is the exponent

to of

American

American Dash, Combativeness; Courage, Confidence, American Energy, Eagerness, Enthusiasm; Discipline, Determination; American Pluck, Persistency, Performance; American Spirit, Sagacity, Success; American

Vim, Vigor,

Virility.

"Base Ball," concluded Spalding, "is a democratic game." Spalding's later life was dedicated sure that baseball would as to forever be perceived making conceived, developed, and originally played only in the pristinely American: United States. He helped create the Abner Doubleday/Cooperstown immaculate of baseball and the of baseball's tainted creation-myth heresy conception fought (that it had been fathered by the English children's game of "Rounders"). And he believed it was baseball's manifest destiny to export the American way of life to the rest of the earth. So as winter in 1888, descended on America to decided his successful White up Spalding pack Chicago Stockings along with a team of National the rondure of the League all-stars and accomplish world.

baseball teams had once traveled to England in 1874, but this tour be the first that faced west from California's shores. Starting from teams to San Francisco. across the continent the their way Chicago, played a Then they steamed on to Hawaii, where arrived they day late, and Sunday blue laws prevented their game from being held. The teams had more success in New Zealand and Australia, where the emulous shouts of thousands cheered them on, and where Spalding announced to the players that they would indeed sail further: completely around the world. They did play in Ceylon, but just missed completing that their true passage to India when they were warned Calcutta was unhealthy; prudently they bypassed that country and traveled on as a through the Suez Canal. In Egypt, they used one of the Great Pyramids American

would

68

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In Italy they attempted to play as a backstop), but the Italian refused, despite Spalding's offer of $5,000. From there it was on government to Paris and a game in the shadows of the Eiffel Tower, then to England where the Prince ofWales politely watched a game and then diplomatically responded: "I consider Base Ball an excellent game; but Cricket a better one." Arriving a Delmonico's were the world-travellers back in New York, greeted with dinner attended by such celebrities asMark Twain and future-President Theodore a game in the desert. backstop while playing monument in the Colosseum (with Caesar's

Roosevelt.

The baseball ambassadors, relaxed and triumphant, now played their way across the East back to for a game stopping off first in Philadelphia Chicago, in Camden, Walt Whitman had and a banquet. Across the Delaware River tour teams been following the steamed into New closely. On the day after the discussed York harbor and were greeted by hundreds of well-wishers, Whitman the tour with his young friend, Horace Tr?ubel: "Did you see the baseball boys are home from their tour around the world? How I 'd like to meet them?talk the with them: maybe ask them some questions!" This desire to talk with in America's athletes who, name, had saluted the world, was an appropriate a reaction for Whitman. He had, after all, maintained lifelong interest in baseball, an interest that is significant because his adult life exactly coincides? and temporally?with of American baseball the development geographically with the from its birth to itsmaturity. Whitman, sport, eventually growing up came to see baseball as an essential for America. metaphor it was born in 1845 with of The the formation Baseball as we know Club in New York, where the first recognizable baseball rules Knickerbocker were set down in a new rule that writing, key including prohibited throwing at runner in order to put him out. This change immediately the ball the allowed for the use of the hard, lively ball that altered the nature of the game drastically?speeding things up, increasing distances, requiring quicker reflexes, a children's game into a and promptly sport. turning full-fledged On June 19, 1846, the Knickerbockers played the first game of baseball new rules) at Elysian Fields in Hoboken. And only a month later (under the Whitman, young editor of The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, wrote an editorial on "Brooklyn

Young

Men?Athletic

Exercises":

"In

our

sun-down

perambulations,

of late, through the outer parts of Brooklyn, we have observed several parties of youngsters playing 'base,' a certain game of ball. We wish such sights were more common among us. In the practice of athletic and manly sports the young more so than of nearly all our American cities are very deficient?perhaps can even could be mentioned." One other that this early on, see, any country more than forty years laterWhitman would be excited and why proud about to the world their athletic America's manly baseball players demonstrating

men

skills. For in this early editorial Whitman

exhorts

the youth

of the country

69

to

. . .Let us go forth awhile,

a little. "enjoy life

Let

us

leave

our

. . ." Exercise

rooms.

close

was

and get better air in our lungs. essential

for

success

on

the open

from the start was most attracted road, and of all the forms of sport,Whitman to the young game of baseball: "The game of ball is glorious. . . ."As baseball was born, then, it was bound up in Whitman's mind with immediately he would endorse his whole al fresco health. manliness, qualities life?vigor, Whitman followed his own advice; he was himself an avid player. His brother George recalled that while Walt generally "cared little for sport," he still "was an old-fashioned ballplayer and entered into a game heartily enough." or that Walt By "old-fashioned," George probably meant played "softball" was sometimes called "Town Ball" or "Boston baseball?what pre-Knickerbocker Ball" (since, inMassachusetts, that form of the game remained more popular than the hardball version until after the Civil War). Whitman had plenty of some version of "Town Ball" with his students while he to opportunity play was on Long Island in the 1830's. school teaching In any case, baseball teams multiplied in New York and and flourished a decade after the Knickerbockers Within started. got things Brooklyn Brooklyn had four outstanding clubs?the Excelsiors, Putnams, Eckfords, and Atlantics? and there were over twenty-five well-organized clubs in the New York City area. Indeed, this version hardball of the game came to increasingly popular be known as "New York baseball." It had begun as a gentlemen's game, but its demands proved to be democratic; the game insisted on conditioning and men not on social became skill, young breeding. Strong working-class quickly in the club involved, sometimes as "ringers" secretly paid by the gentlemen to Then

their

improve entire

to win?the

chances

clubs

working-class

first

were

hints

started

of in

"professional"

the

1850's,

many

baseball. formed

to

their own club, the barkeepers firemen with according occupation?the a Scottish with theirs. Harry Eckford of Brooklyn, immigrant and shipbuilder, a young group of mechanics into the very first molded and shipwrights and

club,

working-class

named

them,

of

course,

the

Eckfords.

By the 1860's, the best teams were primarily made up of immigrants and men. A team, in fact, sounds like something working typical early Brooklyn Whitman would have approved of and had faith in; David Voigt, in American Baseball, describes The

pitcher

the players:

was

a former

the infielders worked

stonemason;

the catcher,

a

postal

employee;

as

compositor, machinist, shipping clerk, and were two the without outfielders, compositor. Among previous job as a compositor. The team substitute experience and the other worked once worked as a glass blower. The

70

occupations

listed on early team rosters often

read like aWhitmanesque

catalogue Myself," printers,

America. And it is not surprising that in "Song of of working-class we after have been through a catalogue of carpenters, pilots, farmers, machinists,

canal

paving-men,

boys,

and

we

conductors,

come

upon

an (in the vast catalogue of canto 33) image of baseball. At this point, Whitman is "afoot with vision," spanning the continent with his poetic catalogue, [his] when he records a refreshing group of manly pursuits: Upon

the race-course, of base-ball,

At he-festivals,

with

bull-dances,

or

enjoying

blackguard

picnics gibes,

laughter

drinking,

or

or a

jigs

ironical ...

good game

license,

So, in 1855, baseball is clearly one of the things Whitman enjoys, and is also one of the distinctive and identifying elements of the American experience that he finds worth into the of himself. song up and Growing absorbing in Brooklyn, working and living and walking inManhattan, Whitman working as a sport and it was developing found himself in the cradle of baseball while as an institution. And as an editor of several local newspapers, Whitman of course functioned as roving local reporter and at times covered sports. He was one of our first baseball writers. One of his with box score? stories?complete is preserved, an 1858 article he wrote while editing The Brooklyn Daily Times. The opening line indicates the frequency with which Whitman attended ball "The between the and Putnam Atlantic clubs, games: game played yesterday on the was one of the finest and most grounds of the latter Club, exciting games we

ever

witnessed."

Whitman's

is a careful

account

one,

summarizing

the

team and analyzing the effects of injuries on the hapless Putnam were disabled in the course of the game; protective two catchers who (including

action

equipment

wouldn't

make

its appearance

for

another

twenty

years).

He

concludes,

as usual, "The Atlantics, their reputation played splendidly, and maintained as the can We Whitman would Club." admire the Champion imagine why a club of with outdoor Atlantics, Brooklyn composed workingmen jobs, and a club that same to into existence Leaves the Grassdid. year spring of happened These robust players dominated New York-area baseball for years, and gave the reputation of having the best baseball in the country. Brooklyn went to When Whitman D.C., at the end of 1862 to look for Washington, in the war, baseball had preceded his brother George, who had been wounded had formed its first two clubs, the Potomacs and the him. In 1859Washington both made up of government clerks. Their home field was literally Nationals, was not a member of either of the backyard of theWhite House. Whitman these teams, but as a clerk himself (first in the Indian Bureau of the Department of the Interior, then in the Attorney General's office), he may well have joined in more informal games. His young companion Pete Doyle recalls Walt in the

71

was

1860's: "How different Walt in

later

...

years!

He

was

an

then inWashington

athlete?great,

great."

from theWalt Whether

or not

you knew he

played,

to John in the summer of though, he certainly watched. He wrote Burroughs am around more 1866 of his activit?s: "I feeling hearty and in good spirits?go than

to such

usual?go

doings

as base-ball

matches.

..."

The

previous

summer,

was the Nationals had hosted a big inter-city and Whitman tournament, one of the 6000 fans there. All government let off clerks had been probably and even from work so they could cheer on the clerk-players of the Nationals, wrote about the game to one of the Andrew Johnson attended. Whitman soldiers he had nursed: "There was a big match played here yesterday between a two baseball clubs, one from club?& Philadelphia & the other Washington to come off between a New York & the is another club to-day Philadelphia I believe?thousands go to see them play?." The "New York" club Whitman refers to was actually the Brooklyn Atlantics, the same team he had covered a few years before. In fact, the three teams in the tournament?Brooklyn, out to represent nicely and Philadelphia?turned the span of Washington, where had where Whitman's he he now lived, life?Brooklyn, Washington, across the river from where he would his final lived, and Philadelphia, spend nineteen

years.

The Civil War, of course, had a tremendous impact on baseball. Some clubs war or reduced operations as their players entered service. But in the suspended an was it in the Civil baseball War, itself, fact, important role; played during that it became the "National game." The "New York" version of baseball soldiers; it was frequently played in camp, and after caught on among Union the war

the

soldiers

took

it home

with

them.

Older

versions

of

the

sport

gave

York baseball, which became firmly entrenched as the American way the war, itwas already popular; a Christmas game in 1862 drew game. During to New

soldiers

40,000

as

spectators.

Teams

from

some

Union

regiments,

passing

even And Whitman Nationals. played the Washington through the capital, could only have admired his hero-President, Lincoln, all the more for Lincoln's own love of the game?he it as well. Confederate played baseball, and watched even was too. in the Baseball game, troops played prison camps, with played on sometimes Union their Confederate prisoners taking guards. And Albert Spalding makes the claim that, during lulls in battles, Union and Confederate troops occasionally played each other! Spalding, in another of his alliterative flourishes,

expresses

awe

over

baseball's

effect

on

the war:

human mind may measure the blessings conferred by the game of Base Ball on the soldiers of the Civil War. A National Game? no country on the face of the earth ever had a form of sport Why, with so dear a title to that distinction. Base Ball had been born in that the brain of an American soldier reference to the myth [in No

72

Abner Doubleday invented the game]. It received its baptism in our Nation's direst of bloody days danger. It had its early evolution when soldiers, North and South, were striving to forget their foes by cultivating, through this grand game, fraternal friendship with at the time when comrades in arms. It had its best development Southern soldiers, disheartened by distressing defeat, were seeking the solace of something safe and sane; at a time when Northern to turn from soldiers, flushed with victory, were yet willing fighting with bombs and bullets to playing with bat and ball. It was a to the on one panacea for the pangs and humiliation vanquished side,

and

a

sedative

against

on the other. It healed memories.

the

the wounds

natural

exuberance

of

the

victors

of war, and was balm to stinging

. . .

on and on, the sport as a transcendent finally envisioning Spalding goes us a all "to future of "beacon," lighting perpetual peace." Bloated as these claims sound, they are in line with those made by many own and at any rate they hardly outdo Whitman's right after the Civil War, see in the significance of the game: "I theWar, great growing faith, following our our in It American it's will take baseball; game. things game?the people out of doors, fill them with oxygen, give them a larger physical stoicism. Tend a a nervous, to relieve us from being dyspeptic set, repair these losses, and be to us." Here Whitman concerns his with persistent blessing brings together and preservation of the Union. Baseball was one health, American originality, force that could affirm America's "transcendental Union" called (asWhitman was one America and the the also bless post-war fragile bonding; sport it) thing could claim as her own; it was non-European, the American game, grown out of this soil. Even as his own health declined, Whitman's interest in baseball never waned. Nationwide

after the Civil War, baseball became increasingly popular in 1867 headed in and increasingly professional. The Washington Nationals the direction of the frontier by sponsoring the first baseball trans-Allegheny tour; they played as far west as St. Louis. Their resounding defeat of the team led toHarry Wright's Cincinnati founding the Cincinnati Red Stockings team. For over a year in 1869, the first all-professional, fully-salaried Wright's team toured the country and was undefeated from New York to San Francisco.

in 1876, the National League was formed and modern-day baseball was one As the rule evolved, game underway. particular though, change bothered concern in May of 1889; Thomas Whitman. Tr?ubel records Whitman's Harned, a devoted friend, had come to seeWalt after attending a baseball game, at the chance to talk about the state of the sport: andWhitman jumped Then

73

want to ask you a Tell me, Tom?I question: in base-ball is it the rule that the fellow who pitches the ball aims to pitch it in such a way the batter cannot hit it? Gives it a twist?what not?so it or won't be struck fairly? slides off, affirmed that this indeed was the case, andWhitman's response indicates the game even if he was now too debilitated how carefully he still followed

Harned

to attend:

the modern rule then, is it? I thought something of the read the papers about it?it seemed to indicate that there.

Eh? That's kind?I

The rule that concerned Whitman has to do with the way the ball could rule forbade the throwing of the ball; be pitched. The original Knickerbocker so that the batter could to the ball be had instead, pitched underhand, smoothly, over it. hit This rule had been refined the years, first requiring that the hand not be raised above the hip, then requiring only that the hand pass below the as the ball was then only below the waist, then the shoulder pitched, hip was for side-arm the then, (allowing pitching). Originally, pitcher's function to one to put the ball in the hitter hit it; player usually play by allowing simply as the skills of the more refined, the pitched all the games. But players became more strategic. In 1884 the National League removed all pitcher's role became restrictions on a pitcher's delivery. The curve ball, which had occasionally in the 1870's, now became a requisite skill. been accomplished underhand-style was

however,

Whitman,

change

as endemic into

everywhere

"Democratic roundly," "The

can

snake,

the

hear

echoes

of

to Harned,

the

cur,

new

this

sneak

all

the

saw

and

skill

anger

and

rule

entered

of

despair

the custom

"denouncing]

seem

the

he saw creeping

and lack of openness

in his response tells us:

as Tr?ubel the

with

impressed

we

America;

Vistas"

wolf,

not

of the deception

into

the

I ought not to say that, for a snake is modern sportsman?though a snake because he is born so, and man the snake for other reasons, it may be said." And again he went over the catalogue?"I should call it everything that is damnable." seems Harned is described as "amused" atWhitman's response, but Whitman on some earnest. matter in time and He has obviously had the his mind for has engaged in some lively debate about it: "I have made it a point to put the seems no doubt but that same question to several fellows lately. There certainly your

version

Whitman

74

is

right,

keeps hoping

for

that

is

the

someone will

version

everyone

"say it ain't so," will

gives

me."

It's

affirm for him

as

if

that

baseball remains the fair and open and democratic game that he recalled it to be.Whitman already sensed the dangers that would come: the game becoming the pampered pitcher rising above his teammates and playing anti-democratic, once every five so come to pass that?with the days or (indeed, it has only and of hundred-mile screwballs, forkballs, knuckleballs, arm-mangling magic is now the an-hour fastballs?pitching factor in the game). predominant to hold on to an idyllic vision Despite his fears, though, Whitman managed as of the game?baseball the best of essentially bound up with something one of his America. Tr?ubel, for example, recalls Whitman about talking favorite topics in the last years?the idea of "free Sundays," with no blue law restrictions

on

activities:

Talking of Sunday agitation generally and Gloucester [New Jersey] baseball in particular W. said: "I believe in all that?in baseball, in picnics, in freedom: I believe in the jolly all-around time?with the parsons and the police eliminated." the same summer, Tr?ubel records that "W. believes in 'free Sundays. '" The boys should have their ball or any frolic they choose. . . . Whitman here an to voice what would become American clich?: "Baseball, gives early picnics, nexus of American and freedom" formed a commonplace values. It's useless, of course, to speculate who the "several fellows" might have been whom Whitman talked baseball with in his last years, but one fascinating hint does exist. Several times during 1888 Horace Tr?ubel records visits from a Harry was comment always without (except once, when Whitman Wright, irritated thatWright had stayed too long), and inWhitman's for Daybook on 25: visit As from 1885, Walt records, January Harry Wright." "Sunday, Later

with

Traubel's

references,

there

is no

further

comment

that

might

help

in Whitman identify this man, and he has in fact remained unidentified name as if It's that Tr?ubel scholarship. interesting, though, drops Wright's he is someone the reader probably would know. And there was one Harry in the Camden area in the 1880's whose name would have needed no Wright was William to everyone as Harry?a this fine Henry Wright?known gloss; we as have the founder of the first baseball seen, team, player and, professional the Cincinnati Red Stockings. After his playing days, he continued in baseball as amanager and as chief of the umpires for the National League. From finally 1884-1893 (Whitman bought his house on Mickle Street in Camden in 1884 and lived there until his death in 1892) he was the prominent manager of one best baseball team, the National Philadelphia's League Athletics. He was of the special guests at that Philadelphia dinner honoring the world-touring baseball players on their return to America in 1889; he talked to the players Whitman wanted so much to talk to himself. When we consider Whitman's

75

fondness for, interest in, and belief in the game of baseball, it at least seems people who fitting that Harry Wright would have been among the well-known to visit Whitman on Mickle Street. crossed the Delaware or not he knew baseball's no doubt Whether Harry Wright, though, there's that by the 1880's baseball had entered Whitman's very way of thinking. The American game furnished him with figures of speech he seemed are fond and his conversations with Tr?ubel of, especially peppered with to express admiration for a baseball terms. So when he wanted particularly effective passage written by William evoked baseball's O'Connor, Whitman democratic

supreme

offensive

achievement,

the

home

run:

"That's

a home

stroke.

...

O

you can hit a thing like that off with absolute finality." He seemed attracted to baseball metaphors for their colorful, direct, and simple expressiveness. in terms of baseball, telling He even refers to his own writing techniques I have caught much for "That has been method: Tr?ubel, my mainly example, on the as come and go?on the of And the moment." spur fly: things they some more uses same to evoke the Tr?ubel of his image fragmented conversations with Whitman: "Two or three things I caught from W. on the fly, as I busied about the room." At that time, "on the fly" was an important new baseball rules in 1845 allowed for an out if the term, since the original Knickerbocker ball was caught "on the first bound." Only gradually did this rule change; for or not the games they years, teams would stipulate whether played would be "on the fly" or "on the bound." If players chose to play on the fly, they had to be probably especially awake and alert, awaiting the unexpected. SoWhitman did not mean to imply, with the figure of speech, casualness about his poetic as alertness combined with an element of so much methods surprise: his that came his way, to "catch method was to be awake for every opportunity much on the fly." Once when discussing plans for an edition of his complete poetry and prose to wonder about a new with Tr?ubel, Whitman preface for the book. began or not one was needed. a He wavered about whether Finally he fell back on baseball story to help him make up his mind: "My hesitations make me think of a story. The captain of a baseball nine was to be presented with a silver goes on to tell how the captain and the club spokesman pitcher." Whitman

William:

both

the presentation prepared long speeches for the occasion, but when men both them: flustered about, wondering what ceremony came, "they forgot to do?then to to retreated their first causes, finally simple human nature?the

spokesman exclaiming: 'Captain, here's the pitcher!' and the captain exclaiming: 'Is that the pitcher?' So the affair was a success after all, though not according to the rule set." Whitman of course admired this open honesty, this simple set rules and rehearsed elegance; unadorned speech from the heart, displacing set out to do the same thing. Here, then, was the simple his poetry, after all, had of the young American athlete, and good humor and straightforwardnesss

76

Whitman

to emulate

decided

of speaking

this baseball player's way

in his own

writing: if the I guess I '11have to model my preface on that incident?and as successful as the incident I'll be satsified. "Captain, is half preface to get the here's the preface!" "Is that the preface?" We want whole into the the hands?that's object. right pitcher

In recent years there's been a lot of serious talk about baseball. Scholars have or as a way of to American the sport as an analogue history in America American David the character; Q. Voigt Through understanding Baseball, for example, investigates the sport in relation toAmerican nationalism, sense of mission, American racism and the union ethic. And George America's on in and the American Dream," makes perhaps "Baseball his Grella, essay examined

the broadest claim:

Occupying American

sense

country's

and culture.

hope

our national a heritage, unique place in of sports speaks as few other human activit?s

as

of

profound . . .

Anyone

to understand

itself.

. . .The

game

as the most who

does

is as instructive,

significant not

understand

aspects the

this most can to our as beautiful,

of American game

cannot

the country.

was seem to agree; Stephen Crane Many of this country's best writers would as diverse as Marianne Moore, William a first-rate ball and authors player, Carlos Williams, James T. Farrell, Ring Lardner, Zane Grey, Thomas Wolfe, Ernest Hemingway, Bernard Malamud, Wright Morris, Robert Coover, John and all have used baseball as a major image at one time Roth, Updike, Philip or another. They are not alone: Anton Grobani's bibliography, Guide toBaseball Literature, runs to three hundred pages and thousands of entries. As Robert Frost said, "some baseball is the fate of us all." It's important, then, to realize that our most essentially American Walt Whitman, poet, was one of the first of our the vital first?to the recognize significance of baseball writers?perhaps to America. Tr?ubel once called it "the hurrah game of the republic," and Whitman,

in good humor,

responded:

our game: that's the That's beautiful: the hurrah game! well?it's chief fact in connection with it: America's game: has the snap, go, to our as much atmosphere?belongs fling, of the American as our constitutions, institutions, fits into them as significantly, laws: is just as important in the sum total of our historic life.

77

No

writer

since

has

these

exceeded

and

extravagant

fervent

for

claims

the

baseball credo could only have been spoken by a man who game. Whitman's grew up with the sport; saw it develop from its slower, more sedate forms into saw the democratic a game of hardball with demanding "snap and go"; saw the to give way to the young demands of skill force gentlemen roughs; baseball team itself become an image of America, accepting and absorbing men from all walks of life, immigrants from all over the world, molding them into one

a union

body,

to a common

committed

saw

purpose;

the

sport,

starting

coast to coast, spread westward and eventually be played from secure occupation of the continent; saw baseball, finally, America's affirming the rondure of the world, become an athletic image of his soul, accomplishing from Manhattan,

"America's

spreading

and

game"

"the

American

atmosphere"

to Australia,

Asia, Africa, and Europe, then returning home in triumph and comradeship. Whitman had often prophesied the eventual completion of America's continental manifest destiny: "Long ere the second centennial arrives, there will be some to fifty great States, among them Canada and Cuba." Our Bicentennial forty has passed, and baseball even helped salvage this prophesy. Had he lived on into the twentieth century, Whitman have seen American baseball first would of manifest destiny by resettling the Brooklyn in Los Angeles and San Francisco, while Giants York Dodgers it also reached south to Cuba for some of its finest players and then went north to absorb Canada, the National uniting Montreal?however improbably?into was set in motion Toronto into American. and the All this League assimilating

make

the ultimate

confirmation

and the New

the year today's

after Whitman's

American

League,

death when was

organized,

the Western and

twentieth

League, century

progenitor baseball

of was

on its way. The sport had into big business: the year begun its acceleration before Whitman's death the militant National Brotherhood of Baseball Players deserted the National League and began their own ill-fated league; it was the and players. As Whitman first bitter battle between management died, the as come to Era the of what would be known the Golden marked end country of baseball.

Bibliographic Note comments are taken from his book, America's National Game Spalding's American biased York: (New Sports Publishing Company, 1911)?Spalding's but fascinating history of baseball. More reliable histories of baseball's beginnings are Harold Seymour's Baseball: The Early Years(New York: Oxford University Press, 1960) and David Quentin Voigt's American Baseball (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1966). Arthur Bartlett's Baseball and Mr. Spalding(New

Albert

York: Farrar, Straus and Young,

78

1951 ) contains useful information

and anecdotes

baseball tour. For a detailed debunking of Spalding's and for an accurate genesis of baseball, see Robert W. Henderson's York: Ball, Bat and Bishop: The Origin of Ball Games(New A. in Leitner's Baseball: Diamond theRough(New Press, 1947). Irving Rockport York: Criterion Books, 1972) offers a helpful collection of photographs of early serves as the baseball artifacts; a quotation from Whitman epigraph for this in baseball literature. George book, the only use I've found of Whitman on "Baseball and the American Dream" Grella's appears incomparable essay in The Massachusetts Review, 16 (Summer, 1975). Some of the recent books that examine the larger cultural resonance of baseball include Leverett T. Smith's The American Dream and theNational Gdme(Bowling Green: Bowling Green about the 1888-89 worldwide creation myth, Doubleday

Lee Umphlett's The University Popular Press, 1975), Wiley theAmerican Experience (Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, Q. Voigt 'sAmerica Through Baseball (Chicago: Nelson Hall, is Anton Grobani complete bibliography of baseball writing

Sporting Myth and 1975), and David most 1976). The to 'sGuide Baseball

Frost's Literature{Detroit: Gale Research Company, 1975). Some of Robert comments on baseball, including the one I quote, can be found in the essay, in his Selected Prose, edited by Hyde Cox "Perfect Day?A Day of Prowess," and Edward Connery Lathem (New York: Collier Books, 1968). comments to Horace Tr?ubel are all taken from Tr?ubel 'sWith Whitman's in Camden: vols. 1-3 (1905-1912; rpt. New York: Rowman and vol. ed. of 4, 1961); Sculley Bradley (Philadelphia: University vol. ed. Tr?ubel Gertrude Southern Press, 5, Pennsylvania 1953); (Carbondale: Illinois University Press, 1964). Whitman's newspaper articles can be found in Cleveland Rodgers and John Black, eds., The Gathering of Forces: Editorials, Dramatic Reviews and Other Material Written by Walt and and Essays, Literary Whitman as Editor of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle in 1846 and ??47(New York: G.P. Walt Whitman Littlefield,

Putnam's Sons, 1920); and in Emory Holloway and Vernolian Schwarz, eds., I Sit and Look Out: Editorials from The Brooklyn Daily Times byWalt Whitman(New are York: Columbia University reminiscences Press, 1932). Peter Doyle's included in Richard Maurice B?cke, ed., Calamus (Boston: Laurens Maynard, recollections are in Tr?ubel, Bucke, and Thomas 1897), and George Whitman's B. Harned, In Re Walt Whitman (Philadelphia: David McKay, eds., 1893). from Whitman's Quotations poetry are from Sculley Bradley and Harold W. Blodgett, eds., Leaves of Grass: Comprehensive Reader's Edition(New York: New are from York University Press, 1965); passages from the correspondence Edwin Haviland Miller, York: New ed., The Correspondence, t842-?867(New York University about America's manifest Press, 1961);Whitman's prophecy is in in Prose "Democratic Vistas," Stovall, ed., Works, destiny Floyd t892(New York: New Whitman's University

is mentioned in York University Press, 1964), II. Harry Wright New and William White ed. York: York Notebooks, Daybooks (New it should be noted that once, in a weak Press, 1978), II. Finally,

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moment

in Boston, Whitman spoke of football with the kind of rapture that he usually saves for baseball (see Clifton Joseph Furness, "Walt Whitman Looks at Boston, "New England Quarterly, I [1928], 358).

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